(Note: I really want to add a whole bunch of links into this, so stay tuned for those to be dropped in, probably tomorrow. If I remember.)
Things here have been busy, mostly because of traveling and the holidays. Some brief bits, organized randomly:
Kansas – Circumstances did not come through in my favor, and I was driving across Kansas in the middle of the night upon my arrival. It was just tractor trailers on the road, and flat plains as far as I could see in either direction, which wasn’t far, being that it was 2 AM and dark out. I idly wondered what small animals might see fit to charge in front of my car, or worse, if there were deer in Kansas. I grew up with deer as likely car accident precipitators so kept a wary eye out for them during my drive. Thankfully, I pulled into Emporia without incident. The next day, in class, my students were horrified to hear I’d been driving so late at night. “Did you see any deer?” one gasped. “Did you see the camels?!” asked another. Apparently, there is a herd of camels that roams the middle of Kansas. I am very glad I didn’t see them while I was on the road. I would have definitely thought myself hallucinating.
Harry Potter – While in Chicago, Eric and I saw Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire. I always enjoy the Harry Potter movies for their ability to simply consume me in the world they create, since the effects are so good and the visuals amazing. This one was no different, particularly at the beginning when they’re at the Quidditch World Cup. How fantastic it would be to live in that world? Well, aside from the Death Eaters and You Know Who and all… One of my favorite lines in the newest movie is when Hagrid is walking through the woods with Hermione, Ron, and Harry, and going on about how it’s been four years since they all met and how they were such misfits, and then Hagrid, appreciating the fact that they’re all still friends, shouts, “Hooray!” which always (I’ve seen it twice) cracks me up because that’s a phrase I use periodically.
Narnia – Glen and I saw a pre-screening of The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe this morning. It was pretty good, although I felt that it got off to a slow start. I’m also continuously disappointed at what a sop I am at movies; I pretty much cried through the whole thing! It’s sad when the children are sent away, it’s sad when Tumnus (incidentally, I thought actor James McAvoy looked familiar and a quick search of IMDB shows that it’s the same guy who played Leto Atreides in Children of Dune) tries to kidnap Lucy and then can’t do it, it’s sad when the older children don’t believe Lucy, it’s sad when Edmund falls for the tricks of the White Witch (another actor note: Tilda Swinton is one of those people who always looks the same no matter what roles she’s playing, even 14 years apart!), it’s sad when Aslan dies, it’s sad, even when things are going well!!
Wedding – Not sad, even though things are going well! We’re pretty much taking an entire year to get married, splitting things up into smaller pieces and doing them one at a time instead of having everything happen on the same day. Although this alleviates some of the pressure, it does make things drag out a bit! Different parts of the whole thing are at different planning stages, but I feel like we make progress on at least a weekly basis, so that’s good.
Karate – Going very well. I’ve had (in other words, managed to be a student at) some really good classes in the past few weeks, although November was a month of me only teaching my AM classes, and being free to attend classes the rest of the time. December won’t be as easy, since every Saturday but today is my responsibility for teaching. Had a great dan kumite after class with Nathalia on Wednesday, and, strange as it sounds, really good stretching on Thursday.
Work – Full time job doing alright with our website revision taking up most of my time of late. Hopefully just about done with that, and able to get back to some of the other responsibilities I’ve been putting aside. We have taken on at least one intern for the “spring” (she starts in January) so I should do some preparation for her arrival, too.
Consulting – Going really well, with my usual 1-2 gigs each month. I’m both looking forward to and dreading the release of the new software sometime around March. I’m so secure in what I can teach right now and throwing a new version as drastically different as this one into the mix will shake things up. I’ll need to not only learn the software but figure out how to teach it as well. I anticipate that inquiries about training will increase for 2006. Hopefully I can continue to nail them down like this year.
Upcoming trips – Potentially home for Christmas. Kansas City, Missouri, Madison, Wisconsin, and Chicago, Illinois split between two separate trips in March. England in September? I don’t think anything else is planned at the moment. Consulting may cause additional traveling. At least, I hope it does!
Music – Been listening to the newest Death Cab for Cutie album, Plans, a lot, as well as Sufjan Stevens’ album, Illinois. I like all of the DCFC except for the last song, and although the SS album is good on the whole, I usually just listen to about half a dozen tracks from it.
Books – Inching slowly through Dan Savage’s “Skipping Towards Gomorrah” (it’s good but I rarely have time) and two chapters into the sixth Harry Potter, while Jon Stewart’s “Naked Pictures of Famous People” and Jonathan Safran Foer’s “Everything is Illuminated” taunt me from the floor near my bed. Mostly, I read my biostatistics text book. Or, like now, procrastinate reading it.
Classes – Biostats. Awful horrible terrible. Can’t wait until it’s over. A huge time sink, very difficult, and not at all fun. Has actually made me wonder if I have learning disabilities in math. The final is 22 December 2005.
Cooking – Not much recently. We need to get back into it because otherwise we spend too much on pre-prepared food, or don’t eat properly. It’s hard to do a lot of cooking when you’re not here on weekends though, and have short weeks due to holidays. There will be grocery shopping tomorrow and it will be good! Some saving graces – freezing extra portions of soup. I did that with the black bean soup I made a few weeks ago, and currently we have 2 two-portion bowls of turkey soup broth in the freezer that my mother made. Now if we only had veggies to put in it…
Shopping – I love the Eddie Bauer outlet store. Bought about half a dozen shirts/sweaters there today after our movie let out. Bath and Body Works is good too, but I tend to want one of everything, which is bad.
Computering – Firefox 1.5 is out and I’ve upgraded. I’m not sure how I feel about it in total yet. I’ve installed some funky new extensions which I’m still trying out. And the new FireFTP seems to be more stable than the last version. Have you seen the Bravia commercial with the superballs? It takes forever to load, but is definitely worth it. (Quick note about Quicktime – if you don’t have the newest Quicktime, you can’t see the ad. However, be careful which download link you click for the newest Quicktime since it likes to try to install iTunes simultaneously. Thank you, Dan, for pointing me the way to the non-iTunes-ed Quicktime 7.)
Hope all of your 2005s are winding up well and smoothly.
